Girl Talk Thursday: Valentine’s day

When I was in university, I had this professor who we’ll call James (because that was his name). He was an interesting character and a social constructivist. Which simply means that he believes we shape and in turn are also shaped by the world we live in. James explained this by using the example of diamonds. Diamonds, you see, are not valuable in and of themselves. They are only valuable because we assign value to them. They are therefore not worth buying.

I asked him what his wife thought of this. He laughed and moved on to the next student.

About a year later, I was picking up something from his house. He wasn’t home, so his wife helped me. She had the biggest diamond on her wedding/engagement set I’d ever seen. I guess I know who won that argument.

Call me a pessimist or jaded, but I tend to view Valentine’s day in much the same way. That is, it’s a social construct: it’s valuable because we (and Hallmark) have assigned value to it. That it’s the one day out of the year where we have to tell those we love that we love them. That we do things for them that we’d normally never do on any other day.

Bitter? Maybe a little. Neither Darren, nor myself are over-the-top romantics. I’d rather let him know every day that I love him and appreciate him for all he does. Isn’t that what being in a relationship is about, anyways?

8 Responses to "Girl Talk Thursday: Valentine’s day"

My opinion of Valentine’s Day is that is purely commercial. However, it is nice to have an outside force try to make a non-romantic, non-love-spouting, non-gift-giving husband like mine give his wife a little something now and then. My husband will ask me if he’s required to give me a gift for Valentines, birthday, Christmas and anniversary. If I said no (and I do sometimes) I will really get nuttin’ and it’s nice to get something now and then.

I have a strong, strong dislike of Valentine’s Day, and I wouldn’t consider myself a cynic. It just seems like a recipe for way too much disappointment. I’m not sure where that makes me fall on this debate, as I am an engineer and we don’t debate, we theorize and then conduct tests to prove it. I do know it means I am angry and bitter woman on February 14.

My husband is an economist. I wrote a 15 page paper on the DeBeers monopoly. And I told him we’re getting a fucking diamond.
We’ve been married just over a year and it’s still not there.
Maybe for our 10th anniversary.
Manufactured value? Yeah. But those things right purty. And what’s more of an essential luxury than love?
X
Supa